


A final course: the crisis of birth (and what is broken)

by luna65



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal (TV) RPF
Genre: M/M, Madancy, s2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-09
Packaged: 2018-04-19 22:57:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4764095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna65/pseuds/luna65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Balancing the dark and the light of their acting and their actions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A final course: the crisis of birth (and what is broken)

**Author's Note:**

> This one references the making of 02X13 "Mizumono" - which is what the title refers to.

"I've been thinking about love," Mads said as they waited between setups, upon their usual perches and with their usual distractions, showing each other photos and texts on their smartphones. "How much you lose of yourself in someone else."

"Like we lose ourselves in the parts we play, sort of," Hugh noted.

"Are we lost, hmm? I think we found something."

Hugh smiled. "I think we did too. But I can't help feeling bad for Hannibal, and that's the damnedest thing, isn't it? To be sorry for Satan."

"Lucifer was meant to be a tragic figure in _Paradise Lost_ \- I think he's the original Byronic hero."

"You're even beginning to sound like him!"

"Or does he sound like _me_?"

"He's certainly as seductive as you. Will didn't stand a chance."

 

"There's all kinds of love," Bryan asserted during the table-read. "It's not just one thing, even if people don't recognize or acknowledge it, If there's only one thing I could give to people with this show, it's illustrating that fact, you know? That you can have a life-changing relationship with the last person you would have ever imagined you could love."

"Love can be whatever it chooses to be," Mads mused and the others nodded.

"Do you really believe that?" Hugh asked him later over dinner. 

"Certainly," Mads replied before sipping his beer. "I love you, but it's a somewhat different love than Hannibal feels for Will."

"We don't know -"

"Oh yes we do. Bryan doesn't have to spell out _everything_ , does he?"

Hugh shrugged. "Okay sure, but, it's a very dark relationship."

"Certainly. But it's still love."

"I'm worried, a smidge, that it's going to be too intense, filming this next one. It's going to break us."

"It has to, if only a crack. Because what comes after is pain in the emergence."

"I would never betray you like that, but I'll be thinking that I have."

"And the torment will be etched into your face. A terrible thing to do to such a lovely face."

"You make pain look beautiful, y'know. I've always hated that about you."

A pause, then they laughed together, almost as if on cue.

 

Entangled in bed, going through the script, their exchange of ideas as ever quick and sensuous.

"Hannibal says, 'I freely claim my sin,'" Mads read from page 15, "do you think he means murder?"

"I think he means a lot of things," Hugh answered. "Whatever he did to Will, or is planning to do, but he wants to let it all go, to move on from _this life_ , as he calls it."

"Will is breaking his heart," Mads continued, pointing to a direction on page 16: _STAY ON HANNIBAL, tears threatening to brim in his eyes._

"And he's not taking it well."

"Hannibal is unaccustomed to love, thus he takes betrayal far worse than those who assume its inevitability."

"This is what I'm still struggling with," Hugh says, turning to page 32, "where it says _Will can't begin to understand and yet understands totally..._ "

"Tell me."

"He understands all the deceit but not the reason?"

"He can't understand the fact of Abigail before him, but understands, finally, what Hannibal feels, what he wants."

"And Will knows what he wanted, even if he couldn't claim it."

Mads lay back, his expression serene. "What can you claim, my friend?"

Hugh traced a cheekbone with his thumb. "That we are perfectly matched here -" pausing to kiss Mads' chin, "- and here -" picking up his script. "Even though one is tragic and the other -"

"Is not."

A longer kiss brings the discussion to a close, their scripts falling to the floor.

 

"In a way, I _want_ him to stab me. That's how I see it," Hugh said.

"Right," Bryan nodded.

"It's the consummation of their relationship."

Mads raised his eyebrows. "Rather a violent one."

"It's not going to look like that, though. Except that we're covered in blood."

Bryan made a frame with his hands. "Close-up on your expressions as it's happening. You are dying on the inside, Mads. But this is the only way Hannibal can be intimate with Will now that Will has betrayed him."

"You wouldn't do that to me, would you Will?" Mads said, using the tone of voice he reserved for his portrayal of that fallen angel known as Hannibal Lecter.

"Betrayal is something we are both _intimately_ familiar with," Hugh responded in Will Graham's American inflection.

"Oh my god you guys are even talking circles in your sleep!" Bryan crowed jubilantly. "I bet you do it and you don't even know it."

"We practice," Mads said with a smirk. "We practice a lot of things."

"I won't say that's too much information...but I know you're gonna think I'm being nosy if I ask."

They all laughed, but Hugh was blushing _so intensely_ that Bryan had to look away, if only to grant his star a modicum of privacy.

 

"God, that was _operatic_ ," Hugh breathed into the phone.

"High drama is Bryan's specialty," Mads noted from his end. "I think you were perfect, just the right balance of horror and regret."

"Thank you, luv; I was worried I gave away too much."

"Never, dearest one."

"You are a tad biased, you know."

"And I revel in the bias named Hugh Dancy, I hope he has one in the shape of this old Dane."

"Certainly."

"You're blushing again, aren't you? That British reserve."

Hugh laughed. "Get thee behind me, Satan!"

" _Certainly_ , as you say. The view is quite pleasing."


End file.
